Mangwanani! (Good Morning in Shona - good morning for you anyways!)
Finally here! I’m sitting in an office at the Villag of Hope on a slow connection but nevertheless able to email off this update of our arrival safe and sound in Harare!
The flight was 10 hours long but was relatively uneventful - arriving at the airport in Harare was a remarkable difference for the hectic, crowded pace of the airports at Toronto and London. We were the only plane that arrive this morning (it’s now 4:20pm here in Harare, which = 10:45am EST). Everyone got through customs great - no problems, except two bags didn’t get on the same we were on. We’re currently in negotiations with British Airways and hope that the bags will arrive on Monday’s flight. Please pray that they do. The good news is, everyone’s personal bags arrived okay - the bad news is, one of the bags contained mostly tools, and yet more good news is however, that if the two bags HAD arrived we might have had to hang them out the window as we JUST managed to fit all our bags and the guys in the vehicles that picked us up By the time we got out of customs and to the house we are staying at it was 10am. A beautiful house. We got settled in and then Barry had volunteered us to go and start working at the Village! You can count on Barry to get things going right away! Hehe, it’s all good - we were asked and gladly volunteered - a great chance to get right into things. We spent about 2 hours moving bricks, had some lunch and then Gord Cooledge took us for a tour of the grounds. Along the way we’ve met a lot of people.
We got a chance to give the tools that did arrive to the Village of Hope groundskeeper and two of his assistants. That was exciting and they were so appreciative of the gift. We’re looking even more forward to presenting the remainder of the tools in the bag that didn’t arrive today (did I mention to pray for that yet? :))
Well, we’re groggy, tired and ready for some sleep but I’ll tell you this - none of the guys are complaining yet - we’re just amazed and excited at the awesome opportunity we’ve had to be here in Harare and contribute to such an amazing work.
If I get a chance later tonight I might post another update - again, all depends on the power and phone connections In the meantime, we’ve been blessed because we haven’t had any power problems or phone problems yet. Have you guys been praying? God is definitely answering your prayers - so much has happened to see his hand at work Families, some of the guys are sending out emails after I send this off. More guys will hopefully get a chance to send some later tonight. So watch those inboxes. Oh one more thing, can somebody buzz my wife and son and make sure they’ve checked their email Thanks Blessings,
Till next update… - Darren Ethier and the Zimbabwe 2007 Team.